Reading the green is an integral part of putting while playing a game of golf. Changes in the elevation of different portions of the green, that is, sloping of the green, can sometimes be deceiving to the naked eye due to the surrounding environment. Optical illusions caused by angles of environmental features--such as mountains, valleys, gulleys, deserts and so forth--can often makes subtle slants downward in one direction appear to be upward slants. If the golfer mistakingly compensates for sloping in the opposite direction, the accuracy of the putt faces obvious peril.
There have been several attempts to provide leveler devices for golfers to aid them in reading the slope of the green. Some of these devices employ 2-dimensional or linear levelers, often housed within golf clubs, handles, putter blades and so forth. Others include two perpendicularly float levels to show the relative sloping in two directions. Still others employ plumb bobs, pendulums, steel balls and other mechanisms for determining various attributes and parameters of the sloping of a particular green.
These various prior-art leveler devices are either cumbersome, time-consuming and complicated to use, bulky to store, or an affront to golf etiquette. The linear levelers, no matter how housed, fail to clearly indicate the direction of the slope of the green without continually repositioning the device in different rotational positions. The devices having two linear float levelers positioned perpendicularly require mental gymnastics to determine the actual slope.
The process for making these various prior-art devices is typically time-consuming, using costly materials, and employing expensive and complex machinery and processing steps.
It would thus be desireable to have a small, lightweight leveler that may be readily carried in one's pocket or golf-ball compartment in a golf bag and that readily and unambiguously indicates the direction of the slope of the green at any particular location that the device is positioned. It would also be desireable to package such a golf-leveler device in a housing that presents an appropriate image for golfers and is not an affront to golfing etiquette. If would further be desireable to provide a cost-effective device that may be made by a simple process using inexpensive materials.